One thing any researcher knows is that new information is liable to blow old theories to smithereens. The same holds true for Modern Minoan Paganism, an evolving path that incorporates not just archaeological information but also shared gnosis as we work our way forward in spiritual practice.

I'll be the first to admit that I don't like having to change my views. Once I think I have something figured out, it's very pleasant to just hang there, in that space, all smug and satisfied. But I've learned the hard way that nothing is that easy, not just in archaeology, but also in spirituality.

Too often, heathens who try to discuss their gnosis on heathen forums are met with derision. I created the Quartz Metaphor of Gnosis to show why I think we should be able to discuss religious experiences in a religious forum. This metaphor shows how personal gnosis becomes group gnosis. It can’t happen if no one compares notes.

In February 2017, I was walking along a road with my friend and fellow author Jodie Forrest. What happened next, she described as an apport, a word I had to look up. It means an object produced during a spiritualist séance.

It was a sunny winter day in southern California. Ravens danced above an open field. There were always ravens around wherever Jodie was.

This is how I was given to Sigyn earlier this year. It was my first time using my lavender extract that I made from the lavender I grew in my garden. At the time, I didn't know that I was about to need my connection to Sigyn to be very strong, because I was about to take on increased responsibilities as a family caregiver.

Science fiction influenced me to expect that the next step in the evolution of humankind is to ascend to become a being of pure energy. That philosophy is called transhumanism, and it saturates popular science fiction.

I was born a science fiction fan; my dad was a Star Trek fan, and if I had been born male my parents had intended to name me DeForrest, after DeForrest Kelly. The classic Star Trek had several species of energy beings, and humans were on the path to becoming like them. Many of the science fictions I encountered later in life had that idea in them, too. In some of them, a very advanced human could evolve during his lifetime. In Babylon 5, a character who was a telepath turned into an energy being (and blew up, dangerously for everyone around him, but well...) Characters in Buffy and Stargate ascended and became energy beings, and chose to come back to Earth. I even wrote ascension into my own fiction. In my Punch series, a character ascends upon death. A character ascends in Some Say Fire, too, but that's symbolic; it represents the unification of the conscious mind with the subconscious and the inner child.

The first time I traveled with Tom was October 2014, on our first trip to Front Sight. I saw tons of ravens and butterflies. One might not expect a gun club to double as a wildlife refuge, but it has a lot of open land, including large undeveloped areas where people aren’t allowed. The first day out in the open desert, I saw lots of ravens. One raven flew over the range with prey in its beak. And the butterflies! Yellow ones, white ones, blue ones, brown ones, two different kinds of orange ones, even a couple of Monarchs!

Butterflies are Sigyn’s animal messengers, just like ravens are Odin’s. I took both those signs as cosmic thumbs ups.

On Sept. 1, 2014, I was making more of my runes scarves in honor of various gods. I made one for Loki, and in the part of the scarf intended to go in the back of the neck I started the pattern repeat. When I posted a picture of it a friend said it looked like a Sheila-na-Gig and that "You got Loki'd."

So I painted over it, and made it a butterfly. I needed to add runes because I had symbols and runes for Loki, and a symbol for Sigyn, so it needed runes for Sigyn. I didn’t plan out what to write, the words just flowed. Loki gave me the words and I wrote them. I didn’t mean it to, but it came out a plea for transformation.

After I finished the scarf, Sigyn appeared next to me. She approached me differently this time. Before, she had appeared across the room and rushed over, and when she touched my arm I could feel her touch, which startled me because I could not feel any other noncorporeal being's touch, and I had flinched. This time, she just appeared right beside me, and spoke.

I could hear her. I could hear her again, at last!

She had a thin cloak like a monarch wing, a little bit like a silk scarf.I thought she might intend some sort of transformation, some healing by chrysalis. In my novel, the main character transformed in a chrysalis and had to be completely dissolved into goo for it to work, and I was afraid of the process. Sigyn put a corner of the wing on my shoulder. I stiffened up but didn’t move. I knew she was trying to give me maternal love but I was so afraid I started to cry, silently.

She gave me time and returned the next night. Loki kept me still while Sigyn worked. I was briefly in a transparent chrysalis. I didn’t have to dissolve. My wings just attached to me. I still didn’t understand but I knew this was what I had asked for. What Loki had given me the words to ask for. Then he let go.

I heard Odin’s voice making that “mm” sound he makes in my book when he’s thinking. I discovered that he does that to announce his presence when he comes to me. He told me to show him my new wings. Monarch wings sprouted from my human back. And I felt my soul detach from my body.

“Spirit walking?” I asked in my head. “I already know how to spirit walk. That’s how I first met Loki as a child.”

Odin shoved my wings through my back and folded them around my soul within. The wings were for me to use after I die, not before. Then he pointed far away, through the night, and I saw a shining world far away. I thought of when Loki showed me how to get to Uppland in Jotunheim, but this was not the same world. Odin said, “That is Asgard. Now you can always find your way home. Home to me.”

Image: A photo I took of a Checkered White butterfly on a Yellow Tickseed flower in my garden.